Vol. xli.] 90 



very" point gives much additional interest to the study of 

 eggs. If the exhibition of a representative series of clutches 

 of our Bullfinch and its allies can show us that the Bullfinches 

 form a distinct group, showing perhaps closest affinities with 

 Pinicola, but obviously connected also with Carpodacus, 

 Propasser, and Uragus, and on the other side approaching the 

 Rhodopechys and Erythrospiza group, while more distant 

 relationship is indicated to such genera as Chloris, Frinz/illa, 

 and Loxia, surely we must be deeply prejudiced if we fail to 

 appreciate the value and interest of characters of this kind. 



Mr. E. 0. Stuart Baker exhibited the following eggs of 

 Asiatic Finches and Buntings : — 



The first eggs shown are those of Oberholser's genus 

 Perissospiza, which takes the place of Pycnorliampkus of 

 Blanford and Gates. P. i. icteroides eggs are now pretty- 

 well known, but those of P. carnipes are extremely rare, 

 only some half-dozen or so clutches having been taken so 

 far. They may be distinguished from those of P. icteroides 

 by their redder tinge and smaller size, though doubtless 

 bigger series of both might show overlapping. The two eggs 

 shown of Mycerohas meianoxanthus are, I believe, unique. 

 They were taken by myself in N. Cachar, and they differ so 

 much from the eggs of Perissospiza that they may well prove 

 to be of an unusual or abnormal type. 



The next egg I show, that of Propyrrhula subJiimalayensis 

 is also an abnormal egg both in size and coloration. 



In the same box are a pair of the beautiful Propasser-\ike 

 eggs of Pyrrhospiza punicea, of which only two or three 

 clutches have as yet been taken. 



Of Asiatic Bullfinclies three forms are shown, Pyrrhula 

 aurantiaca, P. erythrocephalus, and P. erytJiaca, all of very 

 great raaity and all curiously unlike our European Bull- 

 finches, though the two latter are very like Greenfinches. 



After the Bullfinches come the Finches of the genera 

 Propasser and Carpodacus^ now often united under the one 

 name. With a series of Propasser pulcherrimus pulcherrimus 

 are shown a fine series of its Tibetan subspecies waltoni, a 

 geographical race so close to the typical ferm as to be very 



